


Storm's Eye

by magicianlogician12



Series: You, Me, and the Sea [8]
Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-15
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:01:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25292065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magicianlogician12/pseuds/magicianlogician12
Summary: Jaina is no stranger to the shadows and ghosts that haunt one's past, but Miri keeps hers more well-hidden than most--fortunately, she's no stranger to helping ease their weight, as well.
Relationships: Jaina Proudmoore/Original Female Character(s)
Series: You, Me, and the Sea [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1832245
Kudos: 4





	Storm's Eye

The  _ Silent Tide _ lived eerily up to its name.

Jaina stood on the topmost deck, fists upon hips, watching the few who still remained aboard go about their tasks in near-total silence, a subdued, near-dejected air hovering over them. Captain Shadeweaver was nowhere to be seen, and the ship had arrived in port from patrol several hours ago. Ordinarily the captain was punctual with her reports, or at least sent word if she planned to make a detour, but no such message had appeared, and neither had the captain herself.

It didn’t take long for Jaina’s presence to be noticed. Malinde Yeardley, the only familiar face on deck at the moment, locked eyes with Jaina and changed course, saying as she approached, “If you’re looking for the captain, she jumped ship as soon as we got here. Had it out with Eastland on the trip back about something.”

“Do you know where she’s gone?” there were other questions Jaina wanted to ask, but that one was certainly the most important.

Malinde, unfortunately, shook her head. “No idea. Might try checking the inns around the market, though. She doesn’t drink often, but she sure looked like she needed one.”

Absently thanking Malinde for her help before turning on her heel and striding briskly away, Jaina’s mind was already racing with things Miri and Eastland could have been arguing about on their way back, namely something serious enough the captain would leave her crew to sort her ship out as soon as it arrived in port. It was a short list.

Her search in Tradewinds Market came up empty, however, and Jaina reluctantly turned her attention to Boralus’ more central districts, undoubtedly the seedier part of town. For better or worse, if Miri didn’t want to be found, she was skilled enough at disappearing to make the task difficult.

The sound of shattering glass and a sudden uproar from the hole-in-the-wall tavern next to her pulled Jaina out of her wandering thoughts, and she might’ve kept going down the street in her inconspicuous cloak had a flash of familiar violet stopped her in her tracks.

Cautiously leaning her head around the open doorway, she jolted backwards as someone or  _ something _ impacted the area close by where her head had just been, and when she leaned around again, discovered an empty tankard on the floor, dripping the last of its liquor beneath the floorboards.

Within, a full-scale brawl was taking place, with Captain Shadeweaver–Miri–at the very center.

A gnome and a goblin hung off each of her shoulders, ostensibly trying to pull her down with their combined weight, but as Miri lurched forward to dislodge the goblin, the gnome took a direct swing at her face–her blind side–and connected, but if Miri made any sound reacting to the blow, it was swallowed up in the sheer chaos.

She was already bleeding from her lip, and with what Jaina had just seen, she was likely to be sporting a bruise on her bad side very shortly, as well. When Miri finally shook the gnome free, Jaina also noted the slight unsteadiness to Miri’s movements, though whether that had been brought on by injury or alcohol was anyone’s guess for the moment.

Jaina could have intervened–and wanted to,  _ badly _ wanted to–but it would be a little too difficult to simply explain away, and, for the moment, both she and the captain had agreed their involvement with one another was best kept discreet. Stepping in now would raise questions that would be difficult to answer later.

Still, watching the captain take a fist to the stomach and collapse to all fours before slowly, painfully climbing up again was likely the sternest test of Jaina’s discipline yet.

It didn’t take long after that for the tavern owner to step in and yell something incomprehensible over the fighting, but some of it must have gotten through, as fights broke off and their participants glared balefully at one another before returning to their drinks.

Miri, however, was gone, and Jaina swore under her breath, ducking around the corner and into the side alley behind the tavern itself. A shape covered by the building’s shadow was quite obviously staggering away, and Jaina’s walking speed was more than a match for it. Purple hair, cut choppy and short, added an extra burst of speed to Jaina’s steps, and she reached out and touched Miri’s shoulder, heavy enough to be noticed.

With a swifter jerk than Jaina would’ve expected the captain to be capable of in this state, Miri whipped around, hand ostensibly reaching for a hidden blade before identifying Jaina under the cowl. “Well, well,” she drawled, dabbing at her lip with one finger and shaking off the drop of blood that landed there, “I guess someone on the  _ Tide _ snitched, to bring you all the way down here.”

“Nobody knew where you were,” she said, and hoped there was an accusatory enough edge to her tone to sufficiently humble Miri into providing some kind of explanation, but no such miracle occurred, “so yes, I came looking.”

Shoving a hand into her pocket, Miri produced a folded-up piece of parchment, which she passed into Jaina’s wary hand. “My report from the patrol,” she announced, her words beginning to blur together, “since I assume you wanted that.”

Slowly tucking the parchment into a pocket of her own, Jaina began, choosing her words, “Yes, I did, but–”

“Now if you’ll excuse me,” Miri bowed exaggeratedly low at the waist, “I have to find somewhere else to stir up trouble.”

“ _ Ismirah _ .” Jaina took both of Miri’s shoulders and forced the captain to face her. “ _ What _ has gotten into you?”

Up close, Jaina could see misery shimmering in Miri’s single remaining eye, but she blinked and it was gone again, as quick as Jaina had seen it. Her eye darted away for a split second before the captain muttered, “You have enough to worry about without–”

“Without rescuing you from a tavern fight?” with effort, Jaina kept her voice from rising into something passersby might notice, but the hard clench in her jaw spoke loud and clear what words couldn’t convey here.

“You weren’t even supposed to find out about it.” Miri winced and reached up to where the skin around her eyepatch-covered eye was already starting to discolor with bruising. “If I promise to slink back to my ship instead of cause more trouble, will that get me off the hook for tonight?”

“Absolutely not.” Jaina released Miri’s shoulders and not-so-subtly turned them back in the direction of Tradewinds Market, beyond which the  _ Tide _ was still docked.

“Suppose that’s fair,” Miri admitted, and led the way back.

Her gait was steady enough not to draw attention, but was also obviously not her usual smooth, loping one, with long, sauntering strides. At the moment she looked mere seconds away from tripping over her own long legs, but they made it safely back to the  _ Tide _ without further incident.

Malinde was still on the deck, and raised a brow at Miri as her heavy footsteps announced her arrival. “Guess you’re taking a night off, eh Captain?”

Something defensive flickered in Jaina’s chest, because even if she didn’t know precisely what had provoked this behavior in Miri, she knew it had to be serious, and at the same time knew that intervening in Miri’s inter-crew affairs would earn her no friends among them, so she held her tongue as Miri replied, a dry quirk to her lip, “Something like that, yes. Tell Elanarel she’s got the deck til I’m back on duty.”

Malinde sketched a lazy salute in Miri’s direction as she led the way into the ship itself, taking the swiftest path to her cabin at the ship’s aft section. With the door safely sealed behind them, Jaina turned her attention on Miri again, who was rummaging through a small crate of what looked like first aid supplies. “Malinde said you and Eastland had a…disagreement on your way back. Is that related to this?”

Miri snorted and the sound of glass bottles clinking against one another intensified for a moment before she produced the one she wanted, uncorking it and dousing a piece of cloth with it, which she then placed on her bleeding, swollen lip. “Yes, they’re related. You have enough things on your plate, Proudmoore. I’ll sort it out.”

“And I suppose this is what ‘sorting it out’ looks like?” Jaina motioned towards the captain herself, dabbing at her bloody lip with a bruise slowly forming next to her bad eye.

“I went a little overboard, sure…” Miri said with a rakish grin, which was lopsided either with pain or inebriation, “…but I’m still alive. So shush.”

“Ismirah.”

It was only her name, but the captain lost her false lightheartedness, and sank into the chair beside her cabin’s window. Miri’s gaze was still focused on the view of the docks outside when she said, “I was stretching myself too thin on this patrol. I’ll admit that. Wasn’t delegating tasks like I usually do. Eastland called me on it, but then he  _ also _ said this would be easier if I had a first mate.”

That topic, Jaina knew, was a sore one for Miri, having lost her last first mate to Magister Umbric’s experiments in Telogrus Rift. Alive, but transformed, and not a seamless transformation, either. “You fought, then.”

“Not with fists or weapons or anything, but yes.” Miri looked back at Jaina that time, with that same misery floating in her glowing eye that had seemed so elusive in the market, now so patently obvious. “But I think it cut so deep because I know he’s right. It  _ would _ be easier if I either named a new first mate, or found one, but I haven’t. It feels too much like giving up on Ky.” Miri laughed a little at herself, more of a scoff than anything else.

“It’s never easy to give up on anyone.” Jaina told her, quiet and heavy.

“I  _ know _ he’s not coming back to us.” Miri leaned forward and rested her elbows on her knees, dropping her gaze to the deck. “I know it’s safer for him, healthier for him, and I want him to do what’s best for him. But it still hurts. Hurts enough that even if I  _ could _ see him, I wouldn’t, because I know he’d take one look at me and he’d come back, even if it wasn’t good for him, and I don’t know if I’d be strong enough to turn him down.”

“You’re not giving yourself enough credit.” crossing the room to stand near Miri’s chair, Jaina rested a hand on the captain’s back, and she didn’t look up, but some of the trembling tension in her spine relented.

“Think you give me too  _ much _ credit sometimes, Proudmoore.” Miri admitted, hoarse and faintly choked at the end. “I miss him. I’ve lost crew members before, of course, but not like this. With no closure. He’s still out there, just…beyond my ability to help.”

There were ghosts in her past, Jaina knew, who mirrored this so closely, close enough that the set of Miri’s shoulders, the way her gaze hadn’t left the deck, defeated in its vulnerability, left an ache in Jaina’s chest. She rubbed her hand on Miri’s back, and said nothing except, “I know.”

“I’m sorry, Jaina,” was all Miri said, barely above a whisper, such a jarring contrast from her loud, boisterous inflection, and she thought she had a fairly good idea what Miri was apologizing for, even though there was no apology needed.

“Why…this?” was all Jaina asked after, but Miri seemed to get it well enough.

“I’m not good at much, but I can fight, and I can take hits.” Miri leaned more of her weight against where Jaina stood beside her chair. “Pain on my skin and bones is easier than pain in my heart. As horribly poetic as that sounds.”

It was enough to prompt a smile out of both of them, small and shaky, as Miri looked up again, and Jaina moved the hand that had been carefully rubbing Miri’s back up to cup the back of her head instead. “Do you want to stay here, or go back to the Keep?”

“Why Proudmoore, I put you through all that and you  _ still _ invite me home?” the grin on Miri’s lips was far more like the usual Jaina was accustomed to seeing, and she didn’t even mind when Miri added, “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think I was special.”

“You are.” Jaina told her, utterly serious, and it was worth it when Miri laughed, shorter than normal, but it was something.

“As much as I’d  _ like _ to sleep in a real bed, I don’t know if I’d make it to the keep.” Miri admitted, regarding her own bed with no small degree of wistfulness. “So I’ll stay the night here. I’ll see you tomorrow, though.”

“I suppose I wasn’t clear enough.” Jaina pulled her inconspicuous cloak off and draped it over Miri’s desk chair. “I was asking for both of us.”

Miri rolled her whole head in lieu of rolling her single remaining eye, subdued mirth dancing in her grin. “Keeping an eye on me to make sure I don’t get up to any trouble, hmm? You wound me, truly.”

“You’re already wounded,” Jaina poked Miri’s ribs, and the captain gasped–she’d been guessing when she assumed the blow the captain had taken to her stomach was still smarting, but obviously it was a sound one, “so I don’t think you could get up to more trouble if you tried.”

“Proudmoore, you  _ vastly _ underestimate the amount of trouble I’m capable of.”

It wasn’t the first night Jaina had spent on the  _ Tide _ , but it was the first since they’d become anything more than allies in the same cause, and the only difference, really, was that she felt no hesitation draping herself over Miri where she was already dozing off, resting her head against the area just between the captain’s shoulder blades.

The  _ Silent Tide _ , Jaina thought to herself, lived reassuringly up to its name, this time.


End file.
